Here is IP Think Tank’s weekly selection of top Online intellectual property news breaking in the blogosphere and internet.
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Hightlights this week included:
US Congress passes Webcaster Settlement Act giving webcasters and music labels more time to negotiate royalty compromise (Law360) (Out-Law) (Ars Technica)
US: RealNetworks files declaratory judgment suit against Hollywood studios over its DVD ripping software; Court temporarily halts RealDVD distribution (Techdirt) (Techdirt) (Out-Law) (Ars Technica) (The IP Factor) (Law360) (Law360) (Techdirt) (Techdirt) (Ars Technica)
German court tells P2P company RapidShare that it must proactively monitor content for infringement (Ars Technica) (Techdirt)
UK Court of Appeal gives software patents a boost: Symbian v Comptroller General of Patents (Law360) (Hal Wegner) (IAM)
Global
IP strategy and having your server in the clouds (IP Think Tank)
ICANN tries to alleviate concerns about independence and its future (Intellectual Property Watch)
Virtual worlds driving new real world IP questions (Law360)
Will the Long Tail do away with IP rights? (IP finance)
High price for IP ephemera? – News Corp’s acquisition of Jamba! (IP finance)
P2P growth slowing as infringement goes deeper undercover (Ars Technica)
Tips for website privacy policies (IP Spotlight)
Argentina
Internationalised domain names (IDNs) to be registrable in Argentina (IP tango)
Australia
Macquarie Bank and serial cybersquatter go around again: Macquarie Bank Limited & Anor v David Seagle (Australian Trade Marks Law Blog)
China
China extends application of ‘Internet Treaties’ to Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR) (WIPO)
China spying on Skype conversations (Techdirt) (Michael Geist) (EFF)
‘Microsoft does not enforce copyright piracy in China because of network externalities’ (IP Dragon)
Europe
EU, US grapple with online counterfeit goods (Law360)
Conference on creative content online: How have consumer behaviour, use of content online and supply evolved? (Laurence Kaye on Digital Media Law)
Conference on creative content online: What financial models for creative content online? (Laurence Kaye on Digital Media Law)
EU Parliament passes ‘Telecom Package’ – only judges can order net disconnections (Ars Technica)
Extraction and databases – the ECJ rules in Directmedia Publishing GmbH v Albert-Ludwigs- Universität Freiburg (IPKat)
Google refuses to submit to Europe’s data protection regime (IMPACT)
Germany
Court tells P2P company RapidShare that it must proactively monitor content for infringement (Ars Technica) (Techdirt)
Indonesia / Singapore
Software patenting developments in Indonesia and Singapore (Rouse & Co International)
Korea
In effort to head off pirates in South Korea, Warner Bros to release movies online before DVD in Korea (IP Dragon) (Ars Technica)
Netherlands
Open source patent office (Innovationpartners)
Norway
Norway to move forward in trying to force Apple to open up iTunes (Out-Law) (Techdirt)
13 member of Norwegian standards body resign in protest over procedural irregularities in approval process for Microsoft’s Office Open XML (OOXML) format (Ars Technica)
Sweden
The Pirate Bay threatens to sue over copyright violations (Techdirt)
United Kingdom
Software patents get boost from Court of Appeal: Symbian v Comptroller General of Patents (Law360) (Hal Wegner) (IAM)
United States
Musician’s form their own lobbying/bargaining group Featured Artists’ Coalition (Ars Technica)
RealNetworks files declaratory judgment suit against Hollywood studios over its DVD ripping software RealDVD ; Court temporarily halts RealDVD distribution (Techdirt) (Techdirt) (Out-Law) (Ars Technica) (The IP Factor) (Law360) (Law360) (Techdirt) (Techdirt) (Ars Technica)
Why MPAA should lose against RealDVD (EFF)
RIAA lawsuit campaign losing credibility (EFF)
RIAA v The People: five years later (EFF) (Ars Technica) (Techdirt) (Intellectual Property Watch)
Congress passes Webcaster Settlement Act giving webcasters and music labels more time to negotiate royalty compromise (Law360) (Out-Law) (Ars Technica)
Copyright Royalty Board keeps download rates the same; iTunes ‘saved’ (Techdirt) (Copyfight) (IPKat) (IPKat) (Out-Law) (Out-Law)
Activision CEO suggests record labels should be paying to have their music featured in video games (Techdirt)
AT&T, NBC lump piracy in with spam, malware as net pollution (Ars Technica)
Wal-Mart shuts down DRM servers (Techdirt) (Ars Technica) (EFF)
Who said DRM is necessary for video games? Not according to Good Old Games founders and Three Rings CEO (Techdirt)
Government admits data mining for terrorists doesn’t work (Techdirt)
Delayed enforcement blocks domain name lawsuit: Southern Grouts v 3M (Technology & Marketing Law Blog)
Judge dismisses plaintiff’s declaratory judgment claim regarding lawfulness of kooks.com based on lack of controversy: Global DNS v Kooks Custom Headers (Seattle Trademark Lawyer)
Judge orders new trial, implores Congress to lower statutory penalties for P2P: Capitol v Thomas (The Counterfeit Blog) (Law360) (Out-Law)
Judge denies motion to dismiss antitrust suit against Apple and AT&T over ‘bricking’ iPhones of people who had changed firmware (Techdirt)
Judge dismisses EMI claims against MP3tunes founder but copyright infringement case against MP3tunes to go forward (Ars Technica) (Techdirt) (Law360)
Blizzard awarded $6 million in damages from World of Warcraft bot maker (Law360) (Ars Ars Technica) Microsoft, Aloft settle claims in three patent suits concerning web browser applications and software (Law360)
Apple drops non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) for iPhone developers (Techdirt)
Apple finally granted a patent for the ‘dock’ (Copyfight)
Bungie Studios executive claims game makers deserve cut of all sales of second-hand games (Techdirt)
Cox implements ‘three strikes’ policy, tells customers DMCA requires disconnection for file sharing (Ars Technica) (Public Knowledge) (Techdirt)
Dozier asserts trade mark rights against Ronald Riley who makes disparaging comments about the firm online (Techdirt) (Law360)
EFF challenges Seer Systems’ patent on internet music files (EFF) (Techdirt)
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) urges court to protect innovation in Arista v Lime Wire (Ars Technica)
EMI sets up own online store as YouTube tries selling music (Techdirt)
Fujifilm settles patent suit brought by FotoMedia Technologies over website technology for sharing photos (Law360)
Google patent would swap cellular contracts for miniauctions (Ars Technica)
Google takes its defense of the Yahoo ad deal to the people (Ars Technica)
Intel to examine AMD split for x86 licensing violations (Ars Technica)
Looks like someone learned from the Scrabulous mess: Popcap Games hires maker of unofficial version of Bejewled game for World of Warcraft (Techdirt)
Safer Networking sues Best Buys for using Spybot program without a license at its Geek Squad computer repair locations (Law360)
Thomson Reuters sues George Mason University for releasing software that can convert EndNote output into more open format (Danny Weitzner) (Techdirt)
YouTube anti-scientology takedowns: good news, bad news (EFF)
Discussion of Jones Day v Blockshopper trade mark litigation over hyperlinking without permission (Patent Baristas) (Chicago IP Litigation Blog)
Class action against Electronic Arts over ‘secret’ Spore DRM (Out-Law)
Muniauction, Inc v Thompson Corp: Federal Circuit again weighs in on software patents (Intellectual Property Law Blog)
Michael Moore makes ‘Slacker Uprising’ freely available online but sends takedown letter over torrent of film (Michael Geist) (Techdirt)